Software provides a competitive advantage

Radan systems have helped Hydram to streamline its operational activities and give it a competitive edge.

Hydram Engineering has grown steadily from a small subcontracting company to become one of the North-east's leading suppliers of sheet metal products.

This success has been built on producing high quality products, competitive pricing and prompt delivery.

A key factor in the company's ability to achieve its goals has been its continued investment in integrated CAD/CAM and manufacturing data systems from Radan Computational.

Formed in 1977 by Harry Young and eventually joined by son and daughters John Young, Judith Porter and Gillian Young, Hydram has flourished into a company with over 80 employees.

It supplies a wide variety of sheet metal subcontract services to customers in diverse industries: electrical and electronic equipment; yellow goods; automotive and aerospace components; food preparation and pharmaceutical equipment; and consumer products.

In addition, the company is in the process of developing its own range of stainless-steel products, including tables, trolleys and storage systems for both the industrial and domestic markets.

By 1986, Hydram had installed its first Shape CNC punching machine but, as the business continued to expand, the limitations of the machine's online programming system became increasingly obvious.

"It was slow and could not handle multiple parts on a sheet", explains Financial Director Judith Porter.

"We therefore decided to evaluate several offline systems in an effort to increase efficiency, eventually installing our first seat of Radan Radpunch software in 1989".

During the next few years, Hydram's investment in CNC machines continued and services expanded to include laser profiling and CNC folding and rolling.

This was matched by the expansion of its Radan CAD/CAM installation, which today includes draughting, 3D design, punching, profiling, nesting and DNC modules.

Commercial Manager, Ivan Russell, says: "In order to provide the best service we can to our customers, we aim to use the best technology available, producing parts as quickly and accurately as possible and at competitive prices".

Hydram prides itself on offering customers a complete service from design to delivery.

It is no surprise then, that customers can supply product information in a number of ways: electronic files - in AutoCAD, Radan or DXF formats; hard copy engineering drawings; or simple sketches.

"In this respect we are increasingly making more use of Radan's 3D capabilities, either to confirm the accuracy of imported data or as a design tool in its own right", says Systems Manager Andrew Jordan.

"The ability to create and modify new products on screen, often with the customer present, provides enormous benefits".

"It not only saves time and costs by reducing errors, but also dispenses with the need to manufacture prototypes".

Once the design has been agreed, Hydram's CAD/CAM system applies standard or company-specific bend allowances to generate flat part developments at the touch of a button.

And, thanks to the integrated structure of the Radan software, each component can easily be tooled, nested if required, and programmed for any selected production machine.

"The flow of work is entirely logical and much more effective than using stand-alone CAD and CNC programming systems", Jordan adds.

Hydram has also invested in Radan's e2i system, a multipurpose management tool that allows users to co-ordinate business activities from initial enquiry and quotation to shop floor job sheets and "work to" lists, to final delivery and invoicing.

A pack is compiled containing all the information that the operators need to run a job - typically this will include information regarding the relevant tooling, the CNC program, material specification, clamping instructions and gauges, as well as 3D visualisations of the component and the machine tool path generated by the CAD/CAM system.

As a result, operators can pretool kits for the next job while the current one is still on the machine.

Operations Director, David Greatorex, states: "e2i has led to significant reductions in changeover times".

"Its shop floor data capture module enables us to track the progress of work through the factory and gives us valuable information for costing and production control".

"Overall, using Radan systems has helped Hydram to streamline its operational activities and give us a competitive edge".

"The resulting savings in time and costs fully support our formula for success - to hone our ability to supply competitively priced, top quality products on short lead times".

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